


Sapphires By Firelight

by OhForAMuseOfFire



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-03
Updated: 2019-06-03
Packaged: 2020-04-07 07:31:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19080379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OhForAMuseOfFire/pseuds/OhForAMuseOfFire
Summary: Jaime's musings while Brienne sleeps beside him that first night and a moment shared when she wakes and reveals her feelings.





	Sapphires By Firelight

Afterwards it was she who fell asleep first. He couldn’t seem to quell the restless energy still coursing through his blood. The moon shone full through the narrow window above her bed as though taking its own final stand against the army of ultimate darkness that had finally, thank the gods, been sent back to the oblivion from whence it came. It battled with the firelight, sending flickering shadows over the stone walls. It also made it damned hard to sleep.

 

When he lay with Cersei it was always dark. Even in the daylight. They drew the curtains or hid themselves away in some forgotten room where the light never reached. It had been a game. It heightened the pleasure she said, hiding what they did from the rest of the world. He told himself it wasn’t because what they did together was wrong. It wasn’t because of the look in his mother’s eyes when she caught them one careless evening. It had nothing to do with whispers of the servants or the dark glowering of the septon or god’s help him the sorrowful eyes of the younger brother who worshipped the ground he walked on. That had always been the hardest part. Seeing the look on Tyrion’s face as he went back again, and again, and again into the arms of someone who took any opportunity to hurt their little brother as viciously as she could.

 

So what Jamie Lannister understood about love was that it was something to be hidden. It brought suspicion and ridicule and shame. It was a weapon. It inflicted pain. Love was cloaked in shadows and darkness, a cold thing that could kill you just as surely as a dragon or a wight. Love was nothing to be trusted. It might give pleasure in the moment but it was just as likely to leave you writhing in agony the next. 

 

How then was he to reconcile that with what he felt now? 

 

The warmth of it. 

 

The simplicity. 

 

The rightness. 

 

The way his entire body came alive when he caught her eye across the courtyard or if they touched by happenstance in the hall at mealtime. The light that swept away the darkness he had always carried with him in his heart. Here in the halls of bloody Winterfell in the miserable, empty, barrens of the north where half the host wanted his head and the other called him Kingslayer if they called him anything at all, here was this...this  _ feeling _ surging through him that was nothing of the old and well known ache. What this woman made him feel was, simply, good. If there was one thing no Lannister in history had experience with it was good.

 

They couldn’t have been more different if the gods had designed it so. Cersei’s implacable beauty, her peerless face, every fold of her sumptuous gowns designed to present an image of untouchable perfection. When he compared that to the woman lying beside him now it was like remembering a dream, something without substance, intangible. How could he look back at that dark thing and the dark creature that provided it and call it love in the face of this?

 

She shifted slightly in her sleep and he felt his body tense as though preparing for a blow. It never came. This was an instinct he’d have to fight to overcome with her. There was no need to brace himself for words as sharp and cold as a wight’s sword. The only real risk were the stares from everyone who would wonder what in the seven hells she was thinking and the litany of ribbing he was sure Tyrion was already preparing. It made him smile to think of it. A real smile of genuine pleasure. That was new too.

 

He looked on her and searched for something that would truly convey what he saw. She’d never call it beauty, might clout him over the head if  _ he _ did, but he had no other word for it. He wasn’t particularly good with words generally and with her more often than not they failed him entirely. Why did he have to be so miserably stupid at everything that didn’t involve sticking someone with a sword? Seven help him he’d spent more words on cutting her down then he’d ever used on compliments.

 

_ Where did you find this beast? _

 

_ You’re much uglier in daylight. _

 

_ Have you known many men? I suppose not. Women? Horses? _

 

It was a fitting punishment that all those blistering slights should be branded in his mind, screaming in his memory when all he wanted was to lie here with her in this blessed, warm quiet and dream of ways to make her smile as she had at her knighting, that night before the world ended and then began again. 

 

Those thoughtless, terrible words he’d flung at her were destined to prick his brains like thorns for the rest of his days. To see her now, alabaster and gold in the firelight, and think on all he’d said and done, the shame burned like bad ale in the pit of his stomach. He rolled onto his side with his back to her, burying his head in the pillow like a child trying to hide from a nightmare.

 

But no amount of self recrimination would make him stir from this bed. The past might call out to him to hurl himself from the battlements in shame but he was every bit as immovable as those stone walls. Shame or no he’d have to be dragged from the room by the king of Night himself. Not while she lay there. Not when he could watch her all he liked. He turned back to face, to record every freckle, every curve that it might replace the bitter past. The furs had slipped down around her hips, all but inviting a wandering hand to explore what lay just out of sight. She was radiant by the light of the fire and so bloody warm. He moved closer, as close as he could without waking her though the temptation to touch her nearly killed him. He couldn’t remember ever having seen her look so peaceful. But he didn’t want to break the spell just yet. So he lay beside her, head propped on his good arm and allowed himself the delicious luxury of drinking her in. 

 

She was like that endless ocean around her island. Deep and astoundingly strong, capable of raging storms that struck down everything in her path and full of mysteries no man would ever know entirely.. But gentle sometimes too, gods so gentle. As constant as the tides, his knight. What was that if not the purest beauty in the world? If he wasn’t allowed beautiful perhaps she’d let him have magnificent? 

 

She smiled in her sleep as though she’d heard his thoughts. He’d never have expected that but there it was, making her look for all the world like a young girl dreaming of balls and dashing, young knights. 

 

Of course her dreams would never have included pretty dresses or parlays with poetry spouting lordlings. He imagined her even as a toddling babe reaching out to touch her father’s sword or looking with longing at the men in his service training in the courtyard of Evenfall. The passion burning in her even them to become one of them. Had he ever wanted anything that much?

 

He’d been able to give her that at least. That was something, finally, to be proud of. If he never did another good thing in his life he’d have at least that to show the gods when he stood before them. Not just a good thing either. A  _ right _ thing. There was no one in the world more deserving of the honor, if it could still be called that. No one living better embodied all those ancient stories of honor and compassion and justice. If there had ever been a true knight of Westeros it was Brienne of Tarth. 

 

Of course no sooner had he bestowed the honor than he’d arrived at her bedchamber door to take it away again. Stumbling into the room spilling Dornish wine and practically seething with jealous rage over that wild haired giant and his lascivious, wide eyed staring. But he hadn’t behaved any better had he, practically tearing off his shirt with his teeth before she even knew what was happening? She’d only made it worse with those damned eyes. Those endlessly blue eyes staring in confusion at his pathetic efforts to turn it all into a jest. Those eyes that had softened as she moved to help him take the shirt off like a patient mother with a sleepy child at bedtime. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been touched with such infinite tenderness. That someone so fierce in battle could hold him against her like some priceless gift that would shatter if handled to roughly, well, it made his chest ache to think of it. That she should even want to, gods, it beggared belief! 

 

A numbing, cold fear began to trickle through him. Had it been pity? Showing a small kindness to a crippled old man who’d done something for her. Surely not. She’d shown him many things in all the time they’d known each other but pity had never been one of them. Perhaps she’d only wanted the experience, perhaps he’d just managed to be the first one to get to her bed chamber. Anyone might have done. Perhaps by tomorrow evening she’d be looking for the lack brained wilding to compare him too? 

 

“I wasn’t sure you’d stay.” 

 

She had not opened her eyes yet so he had no idea how long she’d been awake. He also had no idea how long he’d been staring at her like an increasingly hysterical besotted school boy. That the smile had not yet left her face he took as a positive sign. Her comment was more worrisome.

 

“Do you want me to be gone?”

 

He tried, valiantly he thought, to pitch his voice in a teasing tone but it came out in more of a strangled whisper. He should have known, damn him, that he had no business imagining this was anything more than a single night’s half drunken celebration of, well, not dying.

 

Then she reached out with those long, lovely fingers and gripped his arm so hard he lost his balance and collapsed onto the pillow beside her.

 

“I do not.” 

 

And though her eyes stayed resolutely closed he heard the change in her voice. There was reassurance there. Blessed reassurance. Something else too, though he couldn’t quite bring himself to trust what he sensed in her voice and that firm hold on his arm.

 

He felt a hitch in his chest, like the moment before a charge into battle or at the start of a tourney. He was grateful she couldn’t yet see what he was sure was a truly absurd grin spreading across his face. He must look as mad as the wilding with the red hair. 

 

They stayed like that for a moment. He made himself more comfortable beside her, pulling the furs more snuggly around them both. He felt himself beginning to drift back to sleep. She wanted him to stay and it was enough. 

 

“I don’t know quite when it began.” she murmured. “Maybe at Harrenhal? Perhaps even before that. Though I cannot think why. You were an utter monster before that you know.” She sounded almost dreamy, like someone trying to recall the words of a long forgotten song, but there was that hint again in her voice, something strong and truly meant.

 

He was awake again in an instant. She looked so sweet to him suddenly that he could not stop himself from reaching out to touch her face. She pressed her cheek into his hand and sighed. Kissed his palm, featherlight and warm. 

 

“I grew up hearing stories about you. Did you know that? Can you imagine a horse faced giant of a girl galloping across the shore with a wooden sword pretending to be the golden Lannister Lion? Oh my septa was so furious, all those times she had to collect me and I was covered in sand and salt water from my games. She’d remind me over and over that with a face like mine my only hope of finding a husband lay in comporting myself like a perfect little lady.”

 

She laughed but it was tinged with such sadness. She carried so much pain it killed him. To be told from such a young age that she was ugly, that her worth lay only in how many children she could produce. Worse still, to know in her soul that she was none of the things the world demanded she be. She would never be the demure and yielding maiden.To be an object of ridicule or worse pity, if those she met were kind, was no kind of life for one such as her. 

 

He knew enough not to interrupt but he rolled onto his back and pulled her to him so her head was resting against his chest. Silently he willed her to listen to his heartbeat and truly hear how hard it beat for her. He wanted desperately to tell her how wrong they had all been. How wrong he had been. Her fingers began to trace lazy patterns on his skin, brushing against countless scars like she was memorizing them. But it was that same gentleness as her kiss against his palm. Not seductive, full of that other, deeper feeling. 

 

“I was terrified the day I met you. People think of me as this great, untouchable creature who’s never known a moments fear. It isn’t true.” 

 

So many years ago. Had it really been so long since they’d met? He tried to recall that day, one among a countless number he’d spent lying in filth and chains expecting each morning to be his last. He’d long given up on rescue or ransom. Brienne had swept like a hurricane into that bleak world. He’d never seen anyone like her. Even then he’d known, somehow, that she was something extraordinary. Intimidating beyond belief and burning brighter than the sun. Lashing out at her with every blistering insult he could find had almost been an act of self preservation.

 

“It’s alright.” He was holding her too tight, lost for a moment in the murky waters of his regret.

 

“It was a lifetime ago.” She said, resting her hand over his heart. “The pain we caused each other was a lifetime ago and it was only words. After all you have given me I think I can forgive a few ill thought insults. They weren’t even especially creative. Wench? Was that really the best you could do? I’ve heard much worse I promise you.”

 

If he had to spend a hundred lifetimes doing it he’d make her forget every ill word that had ever been spoken to her and he’d personally behead anyone who tried to level another.

 

Her hand had begun to slip lower. She wanted to change the subject it seemed. Her fingers moved now with a certain urgency, ghosting down to his thigh. Cursing himself for a noble idiot he grabbed her hand to stop her.

 

“You said something about when something began? What did you mean? When what began?”

 

Now she was truly laughing, that loud, braying guffaw that shook her whole body. She rose up beside him and looked down at him with flashing blue eyes, bright with tears. Maiden no longer but come fully into her power as a woman. She was utterly awe inspiring. She shone like a goddess in one of the ancient stories, and he was a willing supplicant, grateful for any favor she wanted to bestow. 

 

“When I began to love you.” she whispered with a breathless fierceness. “You idiot.”

 

He opened his mouth, found he had lost the ability to speak and so closed it again. She laughed again as the first tears slipped down her cheeks. She leaned down and pressed her forehead against his. Her breathing came so fast now, like a frightened bird caught in a trap. 

 

“I knew at Harrenhal. In the bath when you told me what had truly happened to the king. I knew that I would never meet anyone else so valiant. Not if I lived a thousand years. To live all that time with the ridicule and the shame when all along you were the only reason there was a kingdom to war over. They named you Kingslayer when they should have written songs about their savior.”

 

He kissed her then because he couldn’t bear not to for another moment. He couldn’t bear to hear her speak of him like that, with such awe and reverence in her voice. And because he couldn’t tell her what the words she said did to him he showed her. He showered her with kisses like rain. Only he was the dying man in the desert and she was the spring of life he would never be able to live without again. 

 

He pulled her under him, or she allowed him to, and he tore his lips from hers long enough to cast one long look into those fathomless eyes. This was the thing he had wanted all this life, the way she had longed for knighthood and honor. To look into another face and see himself reflected back as someone worthy. She stared up at him with such perfect trust it almost undid him right there. His. This young, kind, untried heart was his. He had to find a way to truly become what she saw when she looked at him. 

 

He felt her legs open and the gentle grip of her hands on him as she guided him inside her. The heat of her and the warmth of her breath in his ear was more intoxicating than any wine in the world. Dimly he realized she might still be in some pain but something very like a growl escaped her mouth when he tried, however halfheartedly, to pull away. Both her hands gripped his backside and her nails raked him just hard enough to elicit an indrawn breath of laughter and sudden, complete surrender to her will.

 

If their coupling the night before had been a sparring match ignited by a need to remind themselves they’d survived then this time it was a dance to celebrate those lives they’d been given back. He gloried in her. The softness of those small, lovely breasts under his hands, how she sighed when he kissed them and gasped when he took a nipple in his teeth. The way the firelight played on her pale, glistening skin as she wrapped those glorious legs around his waist. The strength of her holding him inside her until he was almost breathless with the heat and the pleasure. 

 

The way his name fell from her lips like a prayer.

 

He would have stayed there forever he knew. Not drowning or surrendering as he had always done with Cersei. This was perfect bliss that there was no need to hide or fear reprisal from. When his release came he yelled it to the world making her laugh and shout his name in joyful remonstrance. Let the Starks and their bannermen shake their heads and tsk till they were blue in the face. He would bed this woman loud enough for everyone to hear. Particularly the red headed monster with the horn. He brought her with him over that delirious peak and held her as tight as he could as they fell back down to earth.

 

When they lay side by side again, trembling and sweating she reached between them and grasped his hand in that iron grip. He wanted so badly to speak, to drive any doubt from her mind that might linger even after what they’d shared. He would kill, had killed to keep her alive, would have died if it meant ensuring she would remain in the world. But more than that he wanted to live for her, to keep striving for her. 

 

A love worth living for. That was something to be proud of too. 

 

“I know we may part again,” she said into the gathering dark. “We have no way to know what will happen in the days to come. But Jamie every time I have had to say farewell to you I have died. Here.” She raised their joined hands to her breast and held them there. The rhythm of her heart was no longer wild. She was calm and sure like the sea after a storm.

 

“Brienne.” She tried to interrupt almost at once but now they were his fingers reaching up to press against her lips for quiet. Perhaps it was that her words had set his own free. More likely he was about to make an incredible ass of himself but you didn’t allow a woman to do and say all that and just roll over and go to sleep. 

 

“I -” 

 

Ah yes, excellent start.

 

She turned to face him in the dying light of the fire. They’d neither of them remembered to put more wood on. Those jewel bright eyes would be his undoing or the lodestar by which he set the course of the rest of his life. Either way he’d die a happy man. He tried again.

 

“I cannot give you words. I wish I could. I want to. I am clumsy and old and entirely useless and by rights you should have barred the door against me or thrown me out the window when I -” she started to protest again, more vehemently. He pressed on.

 

“But I am grateful to the grave that you did not. I cannot seem to breathe properly when I’m away from you, you see. Its as if all the air is sucked out of the room and all the light with it and I am left in the dark. I know I am far too old to fear the dark but I do. And I am tired Brienne, so tired of saying farewell.”

 

The tears were gathering again until her eyes shone like the sapphire waters that crashed against Tarth’s shores. 

 

“I have nothing to give you. I am an outcast with no land or titles or money. I have one hand and I drink too much and I’ve spent the better part of my life living like the worst kind of wastrel but I do, oh gods Brienne, I do love you. So much.”

 

He hadn’t known for sure until that very moment that he would say it but the look on her face, the light, and ah there was the smile again. Rather like a stopped clock even the stupidest Lannister did something right once or twice. 

 

Best to quit now while he was out in front.

 

“It will not help with the name calling,” he said, rolling back over onto his back “even when we’re married they’ll call you the Kingslayer’s Mare or - oh Seven help us do you think they’ll start calling me Lady of Tarth?”

 

“Excuse me?” She was sitting bolt upright again staring down at him with that marvelous fierce look he loved so well. He’d never tire of it, never. 

 

“I agree it’s not ideal-” the wind was not entirely knocked out of him when she put the full weight of her body on top of his but it was a near thing. Her face was inches from his, her lips kissing close. Very distracting. 

 

“Did you just, in the most backward way imaginable, ask me to marry you?” Try though he might she would not let him near enough to reach those lips, staying maddeningly just out of reach.

 

“Well I have my honor to think of madam. I have it on the highest possible authority that I am the most valiant man who has ever lived.” 

 

It was some time before either of them spoke again. There was much still to be said between them. More darkness to find a path through and more tears and perhaps heartache. But he could bear those things better now having felt the warmth of her love, knowing it was there, beyond the darkness, waiting for him. No matter what road he traveled now, he no longer walked it alone. It was, truly, enough.

**Author's Note:**

> I love these two, they're probably one of the best pairings in television history and I will never stop being sad that they didn't get a happily ever after however impractical it might have been. So I wanted them to have this time together.


End file.
